Among the many apparently insignificant but nonetheless telling moments of Australian literary history, that one stands out in terms of its sheer unlikeliness and oddity – the prematurely aged, consumptive, alcoholic novelist with his last roll-of-the-dice manuscript, soliciting the approval of an unpublished acolyte; both adrift on a rocky outcrop in the Aegean, one desperately trying to eke a free flight from Qantas so that he could return to Australia and enjoy his long-awaited redemption; the other still hopeful of finding his own place in the literary firmament. One dream neither may have dared entertain was the critical successes that lay ahead: with hindsight we know that there were four Miles Franklin Awards, two apiece, around that distant table.

Hydra, it seems, is the sort of place that breeds such unlikely alliances and intimacies. Indeed, intimacy is something that Hydra does profoundly well. The only point of entry is by boat into the embrace of the small, perfectly formed harbour, with the island’s one substantial town (also called Hydra, or ‘the port’) rising precipitously away from the dockside, cosseted by the monastery-clad uplands. It is not surprising that this basic topography of houses lifting sharply in semi-circular tiers above the flatness of the dockside agora has frequently provoked comparison to the classical amphitheatres that dot the Aegean.

Hydra has other features that add to the intimacy experienced in the best (amphi)theatres – great sound and views. The complete absence of vehicles on Hydra – donkeys and mules still provide the only transport – is not only aesthetically pleasing and appealing to romantic temperaments, but without vehicle noise the natural shape of the landform becomes akin to a giant orchestra shell. Sound is held in the air and sent ricocheting from the hard surfaces of walls and rooftops and along the narrow laneways with startling clarity, bringing neighbours close and the dockside commerce and social activity into every home. The ringing of bells, the clamour of children, the barking of dogs, the braying of donkeys, the crash of harbour-front equipment, the rise and fall of distant voices all drift across the town. Couple this with the clear light of the Aegean and the excellent sight-lines whereby Hydriots have a view

into neighbouring houses, streets, and down to the harbour, and the residents all become intimate spectators.

Hydra is also an amphitheatre adorned with a natural stage in the form of the wide, flat expanse of the dockside, fringed with restaurants, tavernas, and shops. This gathering of dockside commerce is common to many Greek islands, but on Hydra it reaches a picturesque intensity due to the distinctive shape and beauty of the harbour; the broad and gently arcing sweep of the port; the rugged and starkly precipitous backdrop; and the solidly handsome harbour-front buildings. This famously beautiful agora is a kind of stage built for display. It is where generations of locals and visitors alike have gravitated, certain of finding something to watch, and certain of being seen.

The Port at Hydra (Wikimedia Commons)

It was on this dockside stage that Johnston and Clift, and other Hydra expatriates of their generation, spent much of their time. Soon after the couple arrived in 1955 they were joined by Sidney and Cynthia Nolan, and artist Cedric Flower and his writer wife, Pat. These three couples thus started a community of expatriate artists and writers that persists until this day, one that became as renowned for its rollicking sociability and interpersonal intrigues as for its creative output. According to numerous accounts, the daily libations began before the arrival of the lunchtime ferry from Athens – bringing as it did the hope of incoming royalties – and frequently continued until late into the evening. One member of this foreign ‘colony’, Canadian poet, novelist, and later singer–songwriter Leonard Cohen, has remembered the intensity and otherworldliness of those early years:

Everybody was beautiful and young and full of talent and covered with a kind of gold dust. Everyone there had very special unique qualities. These are naturally the feelings of youth, but in this setting, in this glorious setting at Hydra, all these qualities that youth naturally can claim, they were magnified, and they sparkled, and everyone to me looked glorious, and all our mistakes were important mistakes and all our betrayals were important betrayals and everything we did was informed by this glittering significance. That’s youth.

‘Youth’ may have passed from those who remain from the first days of the Hydra colony, but the island and the town have continued to attract new generations, including many Australians, who still find Hydra an alluring place to write, to paint, and sometimes to settle.

From left to right: Marianne Ihlen with her son Axel, Leonard Cohen, David Goschen, George Johnston, and Charmian Clift enjoying dockside life in Hydra (photograph by James Burke, Getty Images)

Where writers and artists go, popular and scholarly interest inevitably follows. In September 2016, a conference, ‘Half the Perfect World: Post-war Literary Expatriation and Sociability’, drew a party of academics, writers, and interested players to Hydra to remember and discuss aspects of the island’s expatriate history and other examples of postwar literary expatriation. The conference took its title from a Cohen song of the same name that references Hydra (‘The polished hill, the milky town / transparent, weightless, luminous / where love’s unleashed, unwilled, unbound / and half the perfect world is found’), a reminder of the expatriate’s dilemma, whereby the world they inhabit may only ever be half of the world they desire. Conference attendees included a number of creative writers, such as novelist Susan Johnson (who based her 2005 novel The Broken Book on the lives of Johnston and Clift); expatriate Australian fiction writer and part-time Greek island resident Meaghan Delahunt; Vogel prize-winner Nick Angel; diplomat-turned-novelist Margaret Barbalet; and poet Andrew Taylor. Together with others they not only experienced firsthand the beauty of the island and the town, but also glimpsed something of the lives of the expatriates of the Johnstons’ era – by eating and drinking at the same tavernas; swimming at the same rocky beaches; walking the same cobbled laneways; and, memorably, by standing in the kitchen where Rodney Hall read My Brother Jack under George Johnston’s watchful eye.

Although George Johnston and Charmian Clift’s joint legend was ignited by their Hydra years, the couple’s flame burnt most brightly when they settled back in Australia, even as their personal troubles deepened. My Brother Jack, published in 1964, was a runaway success, an acknowledged classic of its period, and the first instalment in an acclaimed trilogy that told the story of Johnston’s alter ego, David Meredith, and his expatriation along with his wife Cressida Morley to ‘the island’. Clift herself went on to become one of Australia’s most widely read essayists, with her syndicated contributions to the Sydney Morning Herald frequently bringing the sights and sounds of her former island home, and the lives of her fellow expatriates and Hydriots alike, into the homes of her many readers. Together, the couple ensured that this remote island would come to hold a very particular place in Australia’s literary imagination.